There has been ongoing speculation that President Donald Trump may consider eliminating the federal Department of Education. However, recent state legislation indicates that Texas’s Education Agency (TEA) might face similar scrutiny.
State Rep. Andy Hopper (R-Decatur) introduced HB 2657. The bill’s text repeatedly states that its goal is nothing less than the full “abolition” of the statewide education agency and the repeal of the “public school accountability and assessment system.”
The bill title states that the aim is related “to the abolition of the Texas Education Agency and elimination of the position of commissioner of education, the transfer of powers and duties to the State Board of Education and the comptroller of public accounts, and the elimination of public school accountability and assessment systems.”
Clarifying what this looks like in practice, the law specifies that the State Board of Education “may adopt rules relating to school districts or regional education service centers as required to carry out the duties assigned to the board.”
Certain administrative powers the bill delegates to the comptroller’s office include distributing funds to open-enrollment charter schools, establishing fiscal management guidelines for school districts, and issuing reports to the board on the status of school district fiscal management.
A 2022 state auditor’s office report indicates that the TEA had around 1,200 full-time employees. HB 2657 specifies that all full-time equivalent employees would become employees of the State Board of Education or the Comptroller, as appropriate.
As it is currently constituted, the TEA has a mandate that ranges from overseeing primary and secondary public education to providing legal services to parents, students, and teachers. It also supports Texas’ STAAR test program, a hotly debated statewide assessment test that public school students are required to take.
“The State of Texas Assessments of Academic Readiness (STAAR®) is a standardized academic achievement test designed to measure the extent to which a student has learned and can apply the defined knowledge and skills in the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS) at each tested grade, subject, and course,” the TEA website says.
Another entry endorses the program as important for students’ future endeavors.
“STAAR helps to ensure that Texas students are competitive with other students both nationally and internationally,” the state website adds. However, the assessment has long been criticized as being inaccurate and unimportant to colleges and employers and for encouraging teachers to teach only for the STAAR test.
The prospect of abolishing the agency has mutually intrigued figures often on opposite sides of the same issue.
Education analyst and school choice opponent Lynn Davenport previously told The Dallas Express she would like to see the TEA axed.
“Go for the mothership,” Davenport said. “We need to eliminate the Texas Education Agency and all the fraud, waste, and abuse, and the contracts that are funneled through that agency. And then you take out the 20 Regional Education Service Centers.”
State Representative Nate Schatzline (R-Fort Worth) co-sponsored HB 2657 and is a school choice proponent. More than just getting rid of the TEA, he told Davenport and the audience at DX‘s School Choice Forum that “we are going to get rid of the STAAR test.”
If HB 2657 becomes law, the TEA will be dissolved by December 1.
Hopper was contacted in the production of this story but was not available for comment before the deadline.